This game did not start out good. Here’s what happened with the first six batters:
Single. Single. Walk. Single. Walk. Walk. At that point, we were down 3-0, with the bases loaded, and nobody out – IN THE TOP OF THE FIRST. Ugh. After a double play (which itself scored a run), there was another single, for yet another run scored. We’re down 5-0 in the first inning.
The Rangers picked up a few in the bottom of the second to make it 5-3, but that was as close as we got. All of the Ranger runs came in the second inning. Four hits in a row. Double, single, double, single. That was it. Our three runs.
Just to stamp the point into this game that we weren’t going to win it, the first batter in the top of the third was Adam “Krusher” Lind, who homered to lead off the inning. So much for changing momentum.
Actually, to be honest, after the top of the fourth inning, all the scoring was over – for both teams. The 5th through 9th were all zeroes. But the game was essentially over at that point anyway.
Matt Harrison had clearly his worst outing of the season, and I’d wager into last season, too. This was pretty awful. Three innings, eight hits, three walks, and SEVEN earned runs. While his ERA is still a respectable 3.69 after this outing, it was a lot less before it.
Bleargh. That won’t help several of my fantasy teams.

This game was looking pretty good through the first four innings. Colby Lewis was doing OK, decent pitch count, good if not dominant numbers. The same for Toronto starter Kyle Drabek, a kid who I used to know from his time in the Philly system.
Thought we were having a good time, until right towards the end of the fourth inning, I had a feeling something bad was going to happen. The Jays had two men on via a single and a walk. After a flyout to Murphy, Corey Patterson was caught stealing at third on a double steal attempt. Juan Rivera was at the plate, and we got what seemingly looked like a called third strike to end the inning, but he ended up walking. No immediate damage was caused because Molina grounded out to end the inning.
The fourth also started off not bad. Walk, then two flyouts to get to two outs. It was at this point that the wheels completely fell off the bus. Not only did they fall off of Lewis bus lines, but the bus ran over Colby a few times when the Jays batters were driving it back and forth over him. Three run home run by Corey Patterson. Solo home run back to back from Bautista. Walk to Adam Lind. Visit from Mike Maddux. Two run home run to Juan Rivera. BAM BAM BAM! Three home runs in the fifth inning was the game. We were down 6-0 that point, and it just felt bad.
Dave Bush followed Colby the next three innings and pitched quite well. He only allowed two hits and a walk on 34 pitches. Really nice outing by Dave there. Pedro Strop also followed with a perfect inning of his own, and he’s starting to look quite good out there. We just need more guys out there like that right now. :)
It wasn’t all bad. The Rangers started playing peck away. We got a solo home run from Torrealba in the fifth to cancel Drabek’s shutdown inning, and put us on the board. A couple of doubles from Ian Kinsler & Michael Young put two more on the board in the bottom of the sixth. Now down 6-3. Nelson Cruz found his long missing boomstick and hit a solo home run in the bottom of the ninth to make it 6-4, but that was it. After the home run, the Rangers went down 1-2-3 in the bottom of the ninth.
We had a valiant comeback attempt, but couldn’t get the job done. Definitely were sunk by the three homers Colby Lewis allowed in the fifth. Much has been made this season about a big “Uh-oh” with him that his velocity is down so far this season. That alone isn’t a huge problem, I’m more worried about his lack of command. He doesn’t seem to dominate like he did last season, especially like he did in the playoffs. Joey M over at BBTIA wrote a far more verbose article on this subject than I probably could, so I’ll just send you over there to read it if you haven’t (Linkage here).
I’m not in panic mode about Colby Lewis, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was concerned. I am. Hopefully he gets it together here, and doesn’t go all Scott Feldman on us.

“Three homers, a six-run fifth and C.J. Wilson’s 10 K’s powered Texas past K.C. on Easter Sunday to finish off the series sweep.”
That’s how the official MLB recap starts. It’s a pretty darned good quick summary. CJ Wilson continues to look great this season. I also noticed he’s in the Top 10 of AL pitchers on the strikeout list. He’s tied with Felix Hernandez for 6th place with 31 of them. #1 is Jered Weaver with 39. Wilson had 10 on Sunday. Looked good.
Napoli, Beltre, & Blano (Blanco?!?) each had home runs this game.
This is the last of my “short” updates. Should be back to normal updating with the April 25th game.

A short update due to a week’s worth of missed updates:
Alexi Ogando continues to impress, making Tommy Hunter probably NOT feel that good about getting his job back. Ogando went six innings, allowing just five hits and one run. Way too many pitches for just six innings (114 of them), but he got the job done, which is the bottom line.
The Rangers rode an efficient offense to the win. Just four hits, two walks were all we had to work with, but it worked! Back on top in the AL West. Thanks Boston.

Given I missed a week’s worth of updates, I’m writing just a little about this one.
It can be summed up quickly. The Rangers homered their way to an 11-6 win over the Royals. Five Rangers went deep. Mike Napoli, Ian Kinsler, David Murphy, Adrian Beltre, & Mitch Moreland. Those homers accounted for eight of the eleven runs the Rangers had this game.
Derek Holland continued to look good. Going seven. Gave up five runs, but they were all at once in one inning, the rest of his outing was quite good!

Due to missing a week’s worth of updates, this will be a short one.
Not much else to say though except Jered Weaver is quickly making people forget he used to be the lesser of the two Weaver brothers. He went to 5-0, which is a heck of a record for April 20th. He pitched a complete game, went all nine innings. He more than deserved the win.
The Rangers actually out hit Anaheim this game, but still lost, 4-1.

Even though I missed a week’s worth of updates, and am doing shorter than normal updates for the games I missed, there’s not much else to say about this one, except:

I missed an entire week’s worth of updates, so I won’t say much about this game, other than to add that early on, it seems like CJ Wilson is doing well this year. I know some (myself included) were wondering if he could keep up last year’s level of pitching into this year). So far, so good.
Beltre continues to knock the ball around, as he went deep (with Moreland). This also stopped the Angels five game winning streak.
Wilson went seven innings, just one run. Nine hits, but also nine strikeouts. Looking good.

As is my policy for the last few years, I don’t write about losses to the Yankees.

As is my policy for the last few years, I don’t write about losses to the Yankees.